Adjudication No. 792 (May 1995) [1995] APC 22

ADJUDICATION No. 792 (May 1995)

The Australian Press Council has upheld a complaint against Senior Scene over the publication of a poem with clear racial overtones.

While the Press Council is a strong advocate of press freedom and the freedom of people to express opinions, any published article which, by gratuitously referring to race, sets out to make a point at the cost of offending the sensitivities of any group or individual cannot be supported and must be condemned.

The poem published in the 1994 summer edition of Senior Scene, a publication aimed at senior citizens, purported to be the thoughts of a migrant Vietnamese person on the easy life he found in Australia.

An officer of the Australian Council of Trade Unions and an officer of the Victorian Ethnic Affairs Commission complained that the article was "grossly offensive" and would serve to incite and inflame racial intolerance, and spread prejudice.

In a footnote to the published poem Senior Scene noted that had the article been published "in a couple of months time, we may have committed an offence under the new Commonwealth Legislation, to stop, as they put it, the promotion of racial bigotry".

This notation by itself indicated that Senior Scene was aware that the poem was likely to be offensive to some people and tended to indicate that Senior Scene was thumbing its nose at those who might be offended by its publication.

Senior Scene argued that the item was published in jest to highlight a perceived problem of not being able to express opinions freely. The newspaper, however, undertook to "refrain from printing that poetry further".

The Press Council also noted that Senior Scene printed subsequent letters of complaint about the poem from readers. Nevertheless, the Press Council believes the material should not have been published in the first place.

As it has done in the past in similar cases, the Press Council draws attention to clause 8 of its principles which says: "A newspaper should not place gratuitous emphasis on the race, nationality, religion, colour, country of origin, gender, sexual preference, marital status, or intellectual or physical disability of either individuals or groups. Nevertheless, where it is in the public interest, newspapers may report and express opinions upon events and comments in which such matters are raised".

The Press Council found a clear breach in relation to the first part of this principle and could find no justification of public interest in the publication of such racially offensive material.